Tom Graham - Life on Mars - Get Cartwright

Sam thought of all those he had seen die here in 1973. He recalled Mr Fellowes, the governor at Friar’s Brook, lying in the corridor with his windpipe hacked out, and Andy Coren, the escaped borstal boy who had perished so horribly in the scrap yard. He thought of Patsy O’Riordan, the tattooed brawler from the fairground, burning to death in the ghost train – and the suicidal boxer Spider dying right on top of him. He thought of the fanatics from the Red Hand Faction – Peter Verden, with his Jason King moustache, and baby-faced Carol Waye with her innocent-looking Heidi plaits, who blew Verden’s brains out before turning the gun on herself. He thought of Brett Cowper with the John Lennon glasses, who slashed his wrists and bled to death in his police cell – and he thought of all the others who had died since his arrival here, and he wondered what now had become of them? Was death here permanent? Was it the end of the road? Was this strange, unworldly 1973 the Last Chance Saloon?

McClintock shrugged heavily, said, ‘Very big questions. And I can’t answer them any more than you can, Detective Inspector Tyler. I have my thoughts … and my fears … but I prefer to keep these to myself. All I can say is this: we are here for a purpose, and we had best not fail in that purpose.’

Sam and McClintock looked wordlessly at each other. The only sound was the sizzling of eggs in the pan, and Joe’s radio burbling away.

‘This watch is a trump card of some kind,’ Sam said at last.

‘You feel that too?’ asked McClintock.

Sam nodded: ‘I can’t say why. I just sense it. It’s a weapon, Mr McClintock. A means of attacking Gould. He once possessed it, held it in his hands … It links him to the murder of Philip Noyes, his old rival. It’s the evidence you were going to use to convict him – and somehow, you can still use it! I know it! I feel it!’

‘Yes, I think you’re right. But how to make use of it?’

‘Maybe it’s … Perhaps it could …’ Sam racked his brain and his imagination for inspiration. But he found nothing. The watch was just a watch. There was no way it could hurt anyone, least of all Gould. He shrugged. ‘I haven’t the faintest idea how to use it.’

‘Maybe that’s because it’s my job to use it,’ said McClintock. ‘I failed before. Now, I’ve been given a second chance. And perhaps, it’s my final chance.’

‘We’re in this together,’ said Sam. ‘You and me against Clive Gould. You’re not alone.’

‘I don’t think you’re right there, young Detective Inspector. I think … I sense that I am very alone, that your task was to remind me of what I must do, and that you have now fulfilled your purpose so that I can fulfil mine.’

‘Rubbish. We stand shoulder-to-shoulder in this.’

‘Not if a higher power decrees otherwise,’ said McClintock, and his clipped Scottish accent made these words sound like a sermon from the pulpit. ‘I do not think that Mr Gould will be defeated by strength of arms, or by superior numbers. Something tells me that this is not to be a fight of that sort. Do not think I fail to appreciate your courage in offering to face this foe alongside me. I am moved by it … deeply. But something within me speaks louder than your offer of support. It tells me that I am here to stand against Clive Gould and this time to defeat him. And that I am to stand alone. But more than that, Detective Inspector, I simply cannot say.’

Fresh eggs sizzled noisily in the pan. Joe pulled a lever on his coffee machine and vented a loud jet of steam.

Sam sat looking at McClintock for several moments, and then, with deliberation, he snapped shut the watch’s gold-plated casement, wrapped the chain around it, and held it out to McClintock.

‘It’s yours, Mr McClintock,’ he said. ‘It came here with you. Take it.’

McClintock hesitated.

‘If … If one of us gets into trouble,’ he said, his voice so low it was almost inaudible, ‘if there’s … difficulty of some kind … then we should try to get a message to the other. Any way we can. Even if we’re far apart.’

Sam nodded: ‘Agreed. We’re in this together. We’re brothers in arms, Mr McClintock.’

McClintock thought for a few moments, then reached out with one of his scarred hands and took it. He sighed, and said: ‘Taking that watch from you makes me feel like …’

‘Like what?’

McClintock gave a wry smile: ‘Like the sheriff in a Wild West movie, pinning on his tin star before heading out to face the bad guys alone …’

‘Gary Cooper,’ said Sam. ‘ High Noon .’

‘Aye, it might well have been.’

‘He had a little help, but he got the bad guys in the end. All of them.’

‘I’m sure he did, Detective Inspector Tyler. But he was Gary Cooper.’

Broken buildings. Rubble. An industrial wasteland in a rundown part of town. A row of ripped posters fluttered in the chill wind, advertising the attractions of a nearby stock car rally, with 'big-name' racers like Dougie Silverfoot, Tarmac Terry, and three-time medal winner Duke of Earles.

The Cortina came to a violent halt, throwing a cloud of dust across the posters. Gene emerged, planting his off-white leather loafer manfully on the shattered masonry that lay scattered everywhere. He reached into his inside pocket, pulled out a hip flask, and swigged it dry.

Sam appeared from the passenger side, peering about. ‘And what, precisely, are we doing here, Guv?’

‘Following up a lead,’ announced Gene, hunting for a second hip flask. ‘ That chimney –’ – he indicated with the flask towards the one vertical thing in this otherwise flattened location – ‘– is due to be demolished by that grease-monkey.’ And he indicated towards the short, round steeplejack standing a dozen or so yards away. ‘Only, aforesaid grease-monkey reckons he’s found human remains.’

‘Do you think it could be Walsh?’

‘Well, we won’t find out standing here yacking, will we, Tyler? Now let’s see what’s what before plod starts swarming in.’

They strode over to the steeplejack. He was a round-bellied man with filthy hands, dressed in filthy overalls, a filthy cloth cap perched on his filthy head. He stared through thick-lensed spectacles which were as filthy as all the rest of him. Sam was sure he’d seen this man before.

‘Yes, we’re the fuzz,’ announced Gene, striding up to the steeplejack and waving his ID about. ‘Okay, so what did you find?’

‘A dead fella, all mushed-up like, at base o't'chimney,’ the steeplejack explained, pushing back his cloth cap to scratch his brow with a permanently oil-stained hand. His voice, with its rich, warm Lancashire accent, was even more familiar to Sam than his appearance. ‘Nigh on ’ad ’eart attack when I copped sight o’ that!’

‘Base of the chimney, you say. If we have a poke around, is that thing going to come down on our bonces?’

‘Nay, lad, it’ll stand there till doomsday if I don’t light kindlin’,’ the steeplejack assured him. ‘’Ave no fear, you poke an’ prod to your ’eart’s content. Just don’t ask me to clap eyes on that poor fella a second time!’

‘Leave it to us, we’re used to it,’ said Gene, jutting out his jaw in a manly, unshockable way. He wrapped his camel hair coat about him and marched towards the chimney.

But Sam hesitated before following him. He looked sideways at the steeplejack, frowned, squinted.

The man grinned at him. ‘You all right, lad?’

‘Excuse me, but … is your name Fred Dibner?’

‘Aye, tha’s right. We met, a’ we?’